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Marie Hare - Round Her Mantle So Green (010-01)
This song appears elsewhere in the Manny collection as (004-01), (021-01), (033-03), (065-02), (066-01), (087-11), (097-03), and (101-01). Click any of these to compare (some not yet uploaded). Lyrics as transcribed from this recording: ...robes round her mantle so green. As I stepped up beside her and is this I did say: We will join hands together, and its married we will be I will dress you in rich apparel, you ll appear like some Queen, in you costly rich robes round your mantle so green. Oh, it s no, kind Sir, she answered, you must be refused, for it s I ll wed with no man and you must be excused, through those green fields I will wander and I ll shun all men s do, since the boy that I love died in famed Waterloo. Now, if you have a sweetheart, pray tell thee his name for it s I ve been in battle and I might know the same. It was Willie O reilly. Oh plain to be seen, for it was neatly embroidered round her mantle so green. I was your Willie s comrade, I saw your love die, and as I passed him dying, these words he did cry : saying Nancy, lovely Nancy, if you were standing by, for to breathe your last on me, contended I d die. As I told her the story in anguish she flew, and the more that I told her, the paler she grew. Through those green fields I will wander, and I ll shun all men s do, since the boy that I love died in famed Waterloo. Oh, it s Nancy sweet Nancy, it was I gained your heart it was in your father s garden where we had to part, twas in your father s garden where we were unseen, there I rolled you in my arms round your mantle so green. So this couple got married, so I heard people say, and great nobles attended on their wedding day, now the war it is over and the trouble it is o er, you are welcome to my arms lovely Nancy once more. This song is sung a cappella. The last two words of the song, once more , are spoken, not sung. This recording starts starts on the last line of the first stanza (the first of the song is missing). The only major difference between the published lyrics and those transcribed here is that Manny writes I ll shun all men s view twice (stanzas 3 and 6) but Marie Hare sings I ll shun all men s do both times. The recording cuts to Mrs. Marie Hare singing mid-song: Round Her Mantle So Green 1958 Sources This song appears in Louise Manny and James Reginald Wilson eds. Songs of Miramichi Brunswick Press Fredericton, N.B. pg. 285. This song is at least as old as mid-1800s as the Broadside Ballads Online project has a copy of a ballad "The Mantle So Green" printed between 1846 and 1852 in Belfast see here for more information. Category:H Category:English language The complete version of this recording appears on the Smithsonian Folkways album Folksongs of the Miramichi . 010-01